I'm
getting to the evolution of nappy now. It almost seems like white
people didn't even mean anything negative when they started to use this
word.

They
started with thinking it looked like wool, which is cloth, "nap" being a
fuzzy texture. This was the best way they could think of it to
describe our hair not seeing our curl patterns because slaves were so
disheveled when they arrived and had no way to groom themselves. In
Africa they had beautiful curls the way we see ours today because of
their hair care. This is blowing my mind. Thanks for the great
topic.

And I can't find other good sources about "nappy hair" quickly so if
you have time look at this wikipedia article. Its actually pretty good
although even Wikipedia redirects to "afro-textured" when you type in
nappy hair. If you find a paper post it for me please!

Very
interesting and give examples of what I mean above showing the
evolution of our hair journey and how it related to the transatlantic
trade vs. in Africa. I'm a bit impressed

Excerpt for now:

Diasporic Africans in the Americas
have been experimenting with ways to style their hair since their
arrival in the Western Hemisphere well before the 19th century. During
the approximately 400 years of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade
that forcibly extracted over 20 million people from their indigenous
homes, chaining them to sell as human capital, the beauty ideals
pertaining to their own natural hair changed drastically. The
visibility, and pride, seen in pre-colonial Africa regarding the
afro-hair texture became sparse. Imported slaves were mostly young,
generally between the ages of 10 and 24. Upon arrival to the Americas,
slaves lacked the skills, tools and ability to meet local aesthetic
standards. The issue was most particular to women. Furthermore, there
was no time for hair grooming as slave masters worked their subjects
12–15 hours a day, 7 days a week. The barbaric and desperate social
climate left slaves with little concern for grooming and personal
well-being. The carefully crafted combs and tools available for hair
grooming in their homeland were no where to be found in the new world.
American slaves wore matted and tangled locks, instead of the well
maintained, long, thick and healthy tresses worn by their brethren left
in Africa.

To resolve this, slaves began using sheep fleece carding tools to
detangle their hair which resulted in widespread scalp diseases such as
lice and dandruff. Slaves invented remedies for disinfecting and
cleansing their scalp such as applying kerosine or cornmeal directly on
the scalp with a cloth as they carefully parted through the hair. In the
fields, male slaves shaved their hair and wore hats to protect their
scalps against the sun; female slaves wore scarves and handkerchiefs.
The aesthetic norm for house slaves was to appear neat and clean. The
men sometimes wore wigs mimicking their white masters, and even wore
hairstyles resembling theirs, while the women plaited and braided their
hair. Women with long and/or wavy hair were prone to becoming objects of
jealousy by the master's wife and were often forced to cut their hair,
making them look less feminine.

When the 19th century arrived, new laws were passed that enabled slaves to set aside Sunday
as a day for attending church, socializing, and styling each other's
hair. The women, who wore their hair bound in cotton rollers all week,
would remove their scarves, allowing their curls to hang past their
shoulders. With more time to spend on hair grooming, slaves further
invented and evolved their techniques. Men began using axle grease
to straighten and dye their hair. Cooking grease such as lard, butter,
and goose grease were used to moisturize the hair. A hot butter knife
was sometimes used, afterwards, by female slaves to add curls to their
locks.

Overloaded with the suggestion that straight hair was more acceptable than natural, kinky/curly hair textures, slaves and freedmen
began exploring solutions for straightening, or relaxing, their
tresses. One toxic solution was a mixture of lye and potato which burned
the scalp upon contact. Among whites and African-Americans alike, those
with lighter skin and 'straighter' hair textures were better embraced
socially, and were offered the luxury of upward mobility. Afro-textured
hair was often referred to as 'wool', along with darker skin tones, this
physical characteristic was generally seen as something bad that
'needed to be fixed'. During the mid-19th century afro-textured hair was
basically outlawed in New Orleans. While in public, African-American
women with kinkier hair textures were to cover their hair with a scarf.

Regarding the article, we as women wore scarves/head-wraps waaaaay before we got here. It irks me when people associate head-wraps with slaves and or "aunt jememima". Even in our lowest state we still tried to maintain some sense of normalcy/identity.

@ Tatee, the term nappy always seemed so negative to me. I may have to blame society and my peers for that.

SummaryThis book is fashioned after the call-and-response form of storytelling
created by the slaves in the 1800s. Brenda, a young black girl, has VERY kinky
hair, and her Uncle Mordecai comments on it. He compares it to many things (the
desert, snow), then asks if she’s ashamed. She says no, she’s beautiful,
and the only girl who knows how to talk right (in the King’s English). She
talks about how she got her hair from God because
He wanted nappy hair on earth, how her ancestors had hair like that and came
over with slavery, and that God says her hair is the only perfect circle in
nature.

InterpretationThe book sets itself apart from other children’s books because
of its form: the call and response. As Carolivia Herron explains on her website
:

“The Nappy Hair story is like a praise song from West Africa. In a praise
song the poet or "griot" (say 'gree-oh') praises the chief or leader
of the people. Although the song is supposed to be all praise, sometimes the
griot tries to find a way to tell the chief how to improve.”

Uncle Mordecai is the griot
in Nappy Hair and the audience’s response is indicated by its bolder typeface
and paragraph indentation. This form lends itself well to being read out loud,
especially in dialogue form, but conversely is not as successful when it isn’t spoken.

The history of this book
has been surrounded by controversy. In September of 1998, Ruth Sherman, a white
3rd grade teacher at P.S. 75 in Brooklyn, New York, decided to teach the book
Nappy Hair to her students. Her lesson endeavored to teach racial tolerance
and acceptance to her mostly Black and Hispanic students. The students loved
the book, and eagerly asked for more copies of the book to carry around. Ms.
Sherman made copies of different pages in the book, which were discovered two
months later by a parent. The parent was offended by the material, and began
distributing pages from the book with demeaning racial commentary about Ms.
Sherman in the margin. This event snowballed into more and more outrage in the
community, until the school board was forced to hold an inquiry about the lesson
plan. Ms. Sherman was found innocent of all wrongdoing, but was afraid for her
safety and transferred to another school. Carolivia Herron fully supported Sherman’s
use of the book in her classroom, saying that it was
consistent with the message of affirmation of unique black characteristics that
she was trying to accomplish in the book. For news articles about the controversy,
visit Carolivia
Herron’s website page about the controversy or adversity.net’s
website about the book

Regarding the article, we as women wore scarves/head-wraps waaaaay before we got here. It irks me when people associate head-wraps with slaves and or "aunt jememima". Even in our lowest state we still tried to maintain some sense of normalcy/identity.

Yes. They were so fascinated like it was an American invention.

The only reason they never saw these things from jump is because of the conditions that they created. It sounds like it took a while for the slaves to "normalize" their lives after the crossing. Who cares about doing their hair when half of them wouldn't even survive the trip. So sad when you think about it.

Aww man tatee. It sounds like that was a blowback from our own negative connotation of the word. I see what the teacher was trying to do but she was in the danger zone. It would have been better receive by the parents I think from a black teacher?

This made me think of my son who is an altogether different generation. He loves nothing more than going to school with the biggest afro on the planet. It drives dad crazy but I encourage him, he loves his hair and his friends go crazy like "cool". He has this one mixed friend and his mom keeps his hair brushcut because she doesn't know how to do it. He is the one who absolutely wants that afro bad! They are 9 now and I can't wait to see the two of them at 18. I suspect they will be the opposite.

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